ASE member Professor Helen Mason, of the University of Cambridge has written a short piece ahead of the solar eclipse, which will be experienced across North America later today. 

Professor Mason's article

Just a quick alert that there will be a total eclipse of the Sun across a large part of the USA on Monday, 8th April 2024. Full details can be found here:
https://science.nasa.gov/eclipses/future-eclipses/eclipse-2024/

A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon travels between the Sun and Earth. This can either be a partial eclipse, where the Moon only blocks part of the Sun's disk, or a total eclipse, where the Moon blocks all of the light from the Sun’s disk revealing a crown of fainter light from the solar corona, the Sun’s atmosphere. This will occur across parts of the USA from 12:23 CDT (18:23 UK time) until 15:32 EDT (20:32 UK time).

This spectacular event only lasts a few minutes at each location but is truly awesome!  I have been fortunate to have experienced three total solar eclipses, one in 1998 in Guadeloupe, another in 1999 in Alderney, Channel Islands, UK, and finally in 2017 at the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, USA. I shall not be travelling to see the eclipse on Monday, but many of my colleagues in the USA will be hoping to see the eclipse and also to carry out scientific research during the eclipse. For more information see NASA Sun Science facebook and other social media sites.

For more information about the Sun and solar research, see articles by Helen Mason in Topical Science Updates.
https://www.myscienceclub.com/free-resources/topical-science-updates/ 

SunSpaceArt.org, funded by STFC, led by Helen Mason

Photos by Djohanna Hanrott